


Secrets of a Sun King

by Kypros



Series: Anima [3]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Aging, Established Relationship, M/M, Male Friendship, Post-War, Retirement
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 06:43:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7089622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kypros/pseuds/Kypros
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, near the end of a relationship there are no sharp words or loud explosions. Sometimes, there is just silence. One week past his thirty-fourth birthday, Tenzou wants to retire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Secrets of a Sun King

It started on August 17th—just one week after his thirty-fourth birthday—and Tenzou knew that he was never going to find the full road to complete recovery.

(He did not remember ever telling Kakashi this. Maybe he tried once or twice, like the time when he had returned from that blood traced escort mission to Sunagakure, the one where his skin had turned sun-kissed brown, slow and golden, flecked with those vitriolic shades of red. He remembered that when Kakashi had caught sight of him upon his return, he thought the other man just might have kissed him, right there and then in the middle of his office, filled with the group of foreign delegates. Tenzou’s mouth had fallen open, the quiet words of: “I don’t think I can do this anymore”, sitting quiet and raw on the tip of his tongue, but when he went to speak, he found that his voice was caught tight in his throat, choked at the sight of Kakashi’s quiet, proud smile. Either way, he thought he might have tried, but he never quite got it out, no, not really—)

Kakashi made him smile. And for a while, that was enough.

But then there was this kid—an eleven year old kid, who kind of looked like Sai, or maybe Sakura or perhaps even Naruto (and it all went downhill from there).

He was thirty-four years old when Kakashi had placed a gentle hand on his shoulder, assuring and tangible and warm, murmuring how happy he was with him. He was thirty-four years old when Kakashi, three years older than him, showed no signs of slowing.

But in that moment (or maybe there had been many moments), he realized it wasn’t enough anymore; not for him, not at this age, and not now. And when he had stepped away from the other man with an absent look on his face, staring idly in the setting sun of the clear mid-summer sky, he had somehow realized that this was it:  _this_  was his real breaking point.

He was thirty-four years old with his whole past slowly catching up with him, and this was when he first began to crumble.

(And from then on, it was always just easier to pretend that he wasn’t quietly slipping back into his old ways.)

It started slowly at first. In the beginning, there was no recognizable break or crack in his façade. Casually, he had been reintegrated into regular ANBU activity—Kakashi had simply smiled in that easy sort of way and had joked that Tenzou needed the chance to stretch his legs, least he turn into a dusty, old fossil who simply stood around in his office all day. Tenzou had willingly complied, and when his first field mission in nearly three years had went off flawlessly and without a hitch, he had exhaled a heavy breath that he hadn’t even realized he had been holding. In fact, it had almost felt  _nice_  to be back performing the familiar motions of days gone by.

But now, nearly four years later, Tenzou was not okay.

Air rushed from his lungs into soft lacy clouds as stepped outside into the cool, summer night. It had happened a second time—no, a third—and there was no end to the undulating anxiety he felt every time he had had politely declined an invitation from Kakashi to grab dinner together, or even head down to the market district to peruse the stalls with the dogs.

Instead, he avoided their apartment like it was the plague and spent a lot of time walking the streets, avoiding his responsibilities. He wasn’t sure why he felt like this, but there was a nagging inkling in the back of his mind that it had something to do with his most recent excursion beyond the usual safety of the town walls.

He supposed he shouldn’t have been complaining. In fact, he should have revelled in the break from the monotony. Before returning to the field, he had routinely albeit jokingly complained that his post as Kakashi’s personal bodyguard was a far cry from his old albeit usual tasks as an elite operative of the ANBU. But the position, as routine as it was, _had_ been welcomed at first. This he did not deny.

But after a while however, that familiar itch had returned—that instinct, as it were— and Tenzou, unsure of what to do in the stagnating lull that peace had brought, felt out of place. That wasn’t to mention that it had been months since anything remotely interesting had happened within the confines of the Hokage’s office. The last real threat that he had had to deal with was an errant mouse that had somehow found its way in through a loose floorboard.

So when Kakashi had suggested that he return to regular ANBU activity as a field operative, Tenzou had admittedly jumped at the chance.

Still, as of late he had he felt wholly uneasy about his enduring term as an active field member. The missions he were assigned were becoming less and less docile and as he fell back into the thick of things, he began to stop dropping by Kakashi’s office every morning for his routine check-in and instead found himself reporting to the desk jockey at the ANBU headquarters, mindful that he was altogether not happy.

His latest assignment had been nothing short of a bloodbath and his mission reports had become nothing more than rounded numbers, guesses at kill counts piled onto empty paper, one after another. Exhausted, he thought in the tritest of ways that the last generation— _his_  generation—had grown old and tired. How was that he was nearing his mid-thirties and still doing this?

As it were, another new teammate that he had been assigned to take out into the field for the first time had died today—the boy was now a post-mortem corpse expired in the hot heat Konohagakure’s dry season, and nobody cared because the kid was an academy graduate, three weeks fresh on the ANBU payroll and his real name was still a mystery.

Tenzou exhaled deeply again and kept on walking.

It wasn’t that Tenzou was particularly jarred by the boy’s death (no wait—that was a lie), but some of the things that he witnessed did premeditate a certain sense of uneasiness within one’s self. And to be fair, he couldn’t exactly remember the last time he had actually stopped to even _think_ about retiring since he had struggled immensely in the post-war aftermath all those years ago.

But really, what was it that he was still fighting for? The nations were at peace—there was little to no major conflict and despite his initial reservations, it seemed _this_ peace would be a lasting one. But Tenzou, aging and admittedly tired, was torn. He realized that his whole life had been dictated for him; at an early age he had been melted and remolded as a repurposed tool for the sake and safety of Konohagakure. And beyond his mantle as an elite shinobi, he felt that he didn’t have much of a personal identity; there was nothing concrete beyond the title of ‘ANBU’ that defined him.

If asked to explain his personal life, he could say that he kept a small menagerie of potted plants and spent most of his free time reading old books on architecture. He could cook and was well versed in the ways of doing laundry. He had even grown fond of Kakashi’s dogs. But beyond that, he had no real hobbies; no identifying mark beyond his prowess as a member of the ANBU elite.

The idea of his forthcoming retirement loomed like the impending rainy season; he knew it was going to happen, in fact it was right around the corner, but the concept of it unsettled him immensely. For if he was being honest with himself, he knew he wasn't sure if he knew how to live like that. Without purpose that was. Not alone, at least and not by himself.

He knew it because without that moniker—without that singular identifying word—he felt as though he were nothing. In fact, he felt lost.

Taking another turn, he realized that the route that he was walking home had become familiar—he looked up at the passing buildings and with a certain sense of nervousness, he soldiered on. It had been quite some time since he had been by this way of town and he noted that little had changed. His gaze returned to the roadside and with a blink of his eyes he stuffed his hands into his pockets and kept on walking.  

He didn’t want to admit it, but the whole scenario with the boy was bothering him more than he would allow himself to let on. He thought he had moved passed his idiosyncratic fear of dying, but obviously not. He blinked uncomfortably, a lone finger tracing the length of his clothed shoulder and extending to the bare curve of his neck—it was sore and tender, recently stitched up by a doting Sakura at the hospital a few days past. Her furrowed brow and tightly drawn lips were enough to remind Tenzou that she was not at all pleased by his latest injury, and after discharging him, she had dourly reminded him to be more careful in the future.

“You nearly nicked your carotid artery, Yamato-taichou,” she had stated flatly. “You would have bled out in a matter of minutes.” Uninhibited, he had promised her that he would try, but had stopped himself before letting it slip completely that he had only sustained the injury trying to save the nameless kid who had been decapitated mere seconds later.

Above him, the darkening skies were giving way to sea of shimmering stars. Tenzou bit his lip and dipped his head low. It had been a long time coming, but tonight he would go to a bar alone and he would get drunk and he would go home long after Kakashi had fallen asleep, because this was how it was going to be. There would be no messy interrogations that were always superseded by an impermeable silence come morning. There would be no Kakashi knowing of what he was about to do.

The bar itself was familiar enough—he had been to it a few times in the past with Genma, but he figured it was obscure enough to be left alone. A few of the older men—local farmers and a handful of south side merchants—shot him quizzical looks as he entered, but Tenzou ignored them and found himself perched at the bar in a quiet drunkenness, accompanied a handful of empty shot glasses.

He was a mess of lost charisma and sheer obliviousness when an evenly tempered voice broke his careless inebriation.

“Haven’t I seen this before?”

Tenzou did not react. The man sat down next to him, ordered a shot and mindlessly traced the wet rim of the glass with a long, nimble finger.

“You’ve been avoiding me.”

Tenzou tilted his head ever so slightly and shot Kakashi a sloppy look of inquisition before quietly responding.

“Have I?”

Kakashi downed his shot and signalled for another. Tenzou frowned. This was not what he wanted. This was the exact opposite of what he had wanted and he would not admit that these familiar habits felt as though they were oxygen and that he has been drowning in a sea of endless uncertainty for quite some time.

“You have.”

“I’m sorry,” Tenzou said (although he was not sorry, he was very pointedly not sorry at all) and he continued on with his perpetual lies. “I’ve been busy.”

Kakashi responded with a muted “ _mmhmm_ ” and did not mention the likelihood of his dishonesty seeing as how they lived together and practically knew each other’s schedules—not to mention their distinctive tell-tale traits—off by heart.

Silently, Tenzou wondered if Kakashi could see the hurt on his face or the way his mind replayed the incident with the kid like a turnstile door. He wondered if Kakashi could see the defeat in his eyes, because he was not at all surprised to see him here in this moment of personal weakness. Kakashi it seemed, had a knack for that. He blinked and the scene flashed before him again in the darkness. Eleven—the kid was only  _eleven_ —he had Sakura’s eyes and Sai’s hair and Naruto’s smile, and he took a tanto blade straight to the neck.

He clenched his fist and when he opened his eyes again, Kakashi was quietly staring at him.

Tenzou couldn’t help but to sigh. He knew very intimately that he was very bad at dealing with these sorts of things. And after being in the field so long, one would expect him to be numb to the blatant and expected violence of the profession, but instead it filled him with an overwhelming conflagration of restlessness.

He also knew, thanks to Genma, that he failed at a lot things. He failed at the necessary, important, human things that mattered. Things like courage and communication and good social graces.  _He knew this_.

It didn’t make expressing himself or his problems to Kakashi any easier, even after all this time.

“Why did you ever think returning me to active field duty was a good idea, senpai?” he finally let out with a long and drawn out sigh. It wasn't an accusation, merely a rhetorical question that he knew the other man couldn’t answer. With the last shot he had ordered still sitting in front of him, Tenzou eyed it speculatively before giving in completely and downing it without so little as a snarled grimace.

Kakashi had yet to say a word and Tenzou, unrepentant in his inebriation, continued on.

“It’s just that…a kid died the other day,” he said softly. “He was smart and agile and quicker than you or I, and he died…”

There was an unexpected silence, before a soft “ _ah_ ” slipped from his partner’s mouth.  

“Tenzou—,” Kakashi tried softly, but Tenzou quickly cut him off with a sharp look, hardness and sadness enmeshed intrinsically into the soft brown of his irises. He blinked gently before continuing on.

“Another operative botched the recon, and when I sent the kid in to retrieve the target, he was ambushed. It all fell apart after that.”

Again, Tenzou’s hand fell to the curve of his neck, gentle fingers tracing the raised, red line that was knitted together by sharp, black sutras.

“The worst part is, I really thought I could save him,” he finished numbly. “Instead, I watched as his 4th and 5th cervical vertebrae were severed unevenly and all I could think about was how he was going to be part of the latest statistic in my upcoming mission report.”

There was silence after that. Kakashi didn’t say anything at all this time and Tenzou was content to stare dully at the sticky wooden countertop of the bar. Kakashi ordered another drink, and it was only when he was finished with it did he break the wieldy silence.

“Sakura tells me you came in two days ago suffering from a fairly serious laceration to your shoulder area,” the other man began idly. “She said it wasn’t the first time in the past few months that you’ve come to her looking worse for wear post-assignment.”

Tenzou couldn’t help but let out a small, short laugh.

“I’m  _thirty-four_ , Kakashi,” he let out derisively. “And for a good part of the past seven years I’ve been mostly nothing but a glorified baby-sitter for you. Really, what did you expect?”

The other man shifted slightly on the barstool, and Tenzou dipped his head low.

“I just think…” he tried again quietly. “No, wait—I  _know_  I’ve been down this path before. I know this is how it starts. But I wanted just one night…just one  _moment_  where I didn’t feel overwhelmingly guilty about the things and the people whom I have failed.”

When he looked up, Kakashi was staring vacantly across the expanse of the bar—he looked tired, Tenzou thought. Tired and frustrated. Tenzou brought his fingers to the bridge of his nose and he sighed.

“I’m sorry,” he intoned when Kakashi still didn't speak. His voice came out hard and weary, quiet and jagged, the words all too familiar but ultimately meaningless.

“You could have come to me, Tenzou,” Kakashi finally said, his words near soundless after a too long silence had passed. “You  _know_  you don’t have to go through this alone anymore. I thought you—,”—he paused, eyes falling to the floor, and Tenzou flinched—“— _we_ ,” he corrected himself, “were over this.”

Tenzou crossed his arms across the length of his chest and screwed his eyes shut tight.

“ _I know_ ,” he exhaled sharply. “ _I_ …I know,” he said softer this time. “I thought so too. Again, I’m sorry.”

Kakashi too had closed his eyes, breathing in deeply before turning back to Tenzou with an assured calm that he had seen all too many times before.

“I know you are,” he said at long last, voice tired, eyes tired and Kakashi was tired. Tenzou saw this. He saw this and knew he would find no absolution from this man. Because Kakashi was too kind. Too understanding. Too everything, and  _dammit_ —the man was too trusting. And maybe, just maybe, Tenzou thought dully, this was where he— _Kakashi_ —was wrong. He thought that maybe, just maybe that he was undeserving of it—of the other man’s trust, that was—because when he really thought about, he was simply slipping farther and farther out of Kakashi’s lengthy reach.

Kakashi would not be able to follow him down the path he was going this time.

Momentarily, Tenzou felt deadened. For it was painfully ironic as it always seemed to be like this. Kakashi couldn’t understand; Kakashi couldn’t even  _comprehend_  what was happening to him.  He couldn’t see how the slow and lasting peace of their quiet community was tearing him to pieces, and he couldn’t even notice the slight flutter of his own eyes every time Tenzou lied to him, attempting to fix what had been slowly breaking ever since that mission in Sunagakure. Kakashi could not see these things, but Tenzou did. And he wanted to scream at him: “Kakashi, please,  _please understand_ —“, but he didn’t and kept silent.

He didn’t say it—not because he didn’t want to, but because he couldn’t. All of everything he understood up until this point in time he only understood because he loved. He loved Kakashi and that was why he was silent. The silence was for the other man, because people broke too easily. It was for himself, because while the path he was going down couldn’t fully break him (not yet, anyways), he knew deep down with an acute awareness that was spreading through his entirety of his being as an undeniable fact that Kakashi’s knowledge of it just might.

Instead, he simply nodded and stood to go. Together, they quietly left the bar in silence with Tenzou thinking faintly to the boy whose body he buried on the border of Hi no Kuni under the hot summer sun.

\---

He had reached the West Gate nearly thirty minutes ago, tired and dirty from his latest assignment, but Tenzou, irregular in his usual post-mission routine, did not go home. He did not think of the mission report that was due in the coming hours, with the calculated casualties printed in fine black ink, permanent and unforgiving. He did not think of Kakashi who may or may not have been waiting with tempered patience for him back in the quiet recesses of their apartment. He did not think.

Instead, he found himself walking east through the market district and after a few solitary knocks on a tired wooden door, he was sitting in Genma’s apartment in the early hours of a humid Saturday morning.

“You  _really_  should have gone home first,” Genma informed him dryly, handing Tenzou the warm cup of freshly poured coffee he had brewed specially for the occasion. “You look awful and you smell even worse. Seriously Tenzou, what do they even have you doing out there these days?”

Genma, Tenzou noted quietly, was as pleasant as ever. Even retirement couldn’t curb his companion’s sharp tongue. Nearing forty, the man now spent most of his time buying endless amounts of plants from the Yamanaka’s flower shop and promptly killed them all within a matter of weeks. He was their best customer.

The ones he was tending to now were no different, and Tenzou watched with muted albeit difficult interest as the other man proceeded to overwater a white orchid while underwater a withered maple bonsai. It almost pained him to see Genma slowly killing such beautiful plants.

“It was recon at first,” Tenzou finally told the other man uneasily, drawing his gaze away from the dying foliage. “Then escort missions and now, target elimination.”

Genma had moved onto killing a small chestnut tree and Tenzou watched helplessly as the other man drained the remaining amount of water from the container into the small ornate pot, condemning it to a slow death from root rot.

“They worked you back into it then,” Genma remarked idly, setting down his watering can, the small container now empty. “Typical ANBU.”

Tenzou nodded sagely and took a quiet sip of his coffee. Instantaneously, he fought back a grimace. It tasted horribly burnt and without any added accoutrements such as milk or sugar, he could barely stomach it. 

“And what about you?” he proceeded to ask offhandedly, politely setting the coffee cup aside. “How’s your retirement going?”

Genma let out a wry sounding chuckle before bringing his own cup of coffee to his lips and taking in a heady sip. Expectantly, the man nearly choked and abruptly set the offending mug down on the counter, muttering something obscene about his “damn coffee pot fucking up again”. Visibly disgusted, he poured the rest of the coffee from the carafe down the drain and began rooting around in his cupboards.

“You want the truth?” Genma asked disparagingly over his shoulder, pulling out a small tin of coffee from the top cupboard near the sink and setting it aside. He moved onto rinsing out the coffee carafe and refilling the machine with fresh water.

“I’d expect nothing less from you,” Tenzou rhymed off, shouldering his weight on the curve of his elbows which sat atop the table. Then, abruptly, he stood and brought his cup to the sink, pouring the contents down the drain much as Genma had.

“ _Well,_  Tenzou,” the other man started off with a wry grin. He took Tenzou’s cup from his hand and rinsed it under the still running tap water. “I’ll be honest with you—,”

Genma shut the tap off and paused briefly, a looming silence hanging before them. Tenzou waited patiently and when it seemed like the silence had become unending, Genma began again.

“It’s mind numbingly  _boring_ ,” the other man stated bluntly.

Tenzou, undone momentarily, slowly blinked. Genma’s words…well, they were unexpected and unsure of how to respond to this unsettling piece of news, he struggled to find the appropriate response. Genma, undeterred by his companion’s silence, chuckled again. He then added a few heaping tablespoons of coffee grains to the small machine, flicking it on and trying for a fresh pot that didn’t taste the way Tenzou smelled.

“I mean look at me,” the other man told him, his tone droll. “I keep plants now and we’re sitting here having a chat over coffee for fuck sakes.”

Again, Tenzou blinked and found himself staring at the other man in muted silence. He really didn’t know what to say and so instead, he tried for a dry:

“That good, huh?”

Genma chuckled and emphatically shook his head ‘ _no_ ’.

“No… _I mean_ …” The other man paused, folding his arms over the length of his chest and leaned back into the curve of the countertop, waiting for the coffee to drip.  “You get used to it after a while, I suppose,” he finally decided. “And it’s not  _all_  that bad. I have more time now. More time than I know what to do with, actually,” he chuckled again. “And I bought a fish not too long ago too, so that’s something new.”

Again, there was a drawn out silence. Genma hummed idly, chewing on the tip of the senbon needle that Tenzou had always been known to be perched on the curve of his lips. However, unsure of whether the other man was actually telling the truth or not, Tenzou found himself rolling uneasily on the balls of his feet before acutely fumbling over his next words.

“ _You_ …bought a  _fish_ …” he finally repeated at long last when Genma moved to grab two new cups from his cupboard.

“I did,” the other man smiled. “His name is Ito and he lives in my bedroom on the nightstand.”

Genma worked on pouring the pair two new cups of coffee and moved towards the cupboard again.

“And it’s still… _alive_?” Tenzou ventured to ask, afraid of what he might hear.

Genma’s eyes lit up and he snorted.

“I may kill plants like it’s my new job, Tenzou,” he rhymed off flippantly. From the cupboard he had pulled out a small container sugar and gracelessly set down on the kitchen table with a sharp thud. “But it’s nearly impossible to kill a goldfish.”

Tenzou grabbed his new cup of coffee and returned to his seat, settling back down and pulling in his chair. He scooped a heaping spoon of sugar into the cup before bringing it back to his lips. He grimaced: it still tasted burnt.

“I’m out of milk,” Genma told him leisurely, apparently unfazed by Tenzou’s unpleasant reaction to the drink. “ _And_ —,”—he drew out the word, letting it linger pleasantly in the air—“—I don’t know if I ever told you this before, but I can’t make coffee to save my life.” He finished with a wry smile and stirred a large quantity of sugar into his coffee with purposeful idleness, as though he was sufficiently pleased with himself. Tenzou let out a short lived laugh and Genma’s smile grew ever wider.

“Well it’s good to see you’re spending your retirement doing… _something_ ,” Tenzou finally remarked, calm in face of the unnerving prospects of what a life of retirement was actually like. He pushed away his second cup to his left and licked his lips, the remains of the burnt beverage lingering like a bad hangover. “Even if it’s making horrible drinks to serve your guests,” he added.

Genma, still holding his untouched cup, had repositioned himself at the edge of the sink. He looked admittedly relaxed, although there was a speculative quality to the way he was staring at him, as though the other was wholly unimpressed by his Tenzou’s quiet response. Then, unexpectedly, he took a long, unrepentant sip of the burnt tasting beverage and smirked.

“You’re thinking about it,” he suddenly stated very plainly, setting his cup down on the countertop and pulling out the senbon needle from his lips. He flicked it into the trashcan near the table before snuggly crossing his arms across the length of his chest. “After all this time,” he laughed.

Tenzou was admittedly confused.

“I’m… _what?_ ”

“ _Retirement_ ,” the other man restated drolly, rolling his eyes. “You’re thinking about retirement.”

Tenzou again blinked and before he could respond, Genma continued on.

“You didn’t come all the way here at 8:00 am in the morning after an awful mission covered in more blood than I care to think about—thanks for ruining my door mat by the way—to discuss what I do in my free time,” Genma continued on at leisure. “Clearly you’re thinking of calling it quits, once and for all.”

Tenzou  _should_  have been surprised by Genma’s uncanny ability to pry the unspoken from his lips, but then again, Genma had always been unnaturally intuitive. The fact was he ought to have been _thanking_  Genma for being able to bring up what he was unable to, but admittedly if he were being honest with himself, he didn’t like having the words spoken out loud.

“That’s not it,” he carefully tried to deflect. “I’m not—,”

Genma in response raised a lone brow and unfolded his arms, pressing them back into the edge of the countertop. He didn’t speak and when the silence endured, tempered by Genma’s judgemental gaze, Tenzou broke.

“I mean…I don’t know,” he said at long last. “ _Maybe._  I just… _I_ …” Tenzou trailed off and let out a long and breathy sigh.

Genma rolled his eyes again, a small smile creeping its way up onto his thin lips.

“And what brought this about?” he asked, his grin growing. “Did you finally get tired of the nine to five bloodshed?”

Tenzou considered lying again, but figured better of it. Genma would just wiggle the truth out of him regardless.

Irritated, he sighed at long length.

“I’m getting old,” he finally stated bluntly leaning back into his chair.

Genma raised another lone brow and continued to sip of the blackened beverage in his cup, clearly waiting for Tenzou to continue. Tenzou pressed his lips tight, but mustered the courage to continue on.

“I come back from every mission with an ache in my bones,” he then told the other man, his tone harsher than he meant it to be. “And it’s taking longer for me to recover from my injuries.” He stopped there, unwilling to dig any deeper than right below the surface of his own deep rooted denials.

Genma however, seemed unimpressed with Tenzou’s answer.

“ _And_?” the other man edged out, as if those reasons alone weren’t enough to warrant his forthcoming retirement.

“ _And_ ,” Tenzou grated out slowly, “I’m getting tired.”   

Genma shifted slightly on the balls of his feet, his shoulders sloping as he shrugged.

“Everyone gets tired, Tenzou,” the other man responded idly although not unkindly.  “It’s a fact of life.”

Tenzou again sighed, and he brought his fingers to the bridge of his nose, his head dipped low.

“It’s not just that, Genma,” he said slowly. He felt himself inch below the surface of his emotions, carefully pushing away some of the looser dirt. “I’m getting tired of watching kids die.”

Genma stopped fiddling with his cup of coffee and stared at Tenzou inquisitively. Then, with relative ease he pushed off from the countertop and slowly made his way back to the table.

“Kids die all the time,” he reminded Tenzou uneasily. “We know this. They teach it to us at the academy.”

“ _I know_ ,” Tenzou sighed softly, slouching down in the chair. “I just wish…I wish they didn’t.”

Genma sat down, pulling in his chair and leaned forward on the curve of his elbows. Then, suddenly and all too keenly:

“Does Kakashi know?”

Tenzou instantaneously felt his chest pull tight and wordlessly, he shook his head, a silent “ _no_ ” falling from his tongue. Genma in turn chuckled softly, a quiet hum pulling effortlessly from the curve of his lips.

“ _Typical,”_  the other murmured, mostly to himself.

Tenzou shot Genma a questioning gaze, brow raised high, and in turn Genma laughed again.

“I know I’ve told you this before, Tenzou,” he started with a small smile. “But you really are thick; that is to say, I don’t pretend to understand your relationship with Hatake in the least, but time and time again, I’m surprised. And this time, you’ve really outdone yourself.”

“And after all these years, you’re still spouting off nonsense,” Tenzou shot back, his foul temper once again rising.

“It’s not nonsense,” Genma chuckled again. “You think he doesn’t know? That  _the_ Kakashi—our great and notorious Hokage—hasn’t the slightest inkling of what you’re thinking about doing?”

“And why would he?” Tenzou found himself glaring.

Genma rolled his eyes and sighed headily.

“Oh, I don’t know,” the other man let out sarcastically. “You’ve only known him for what—the past twenty-odd years? And you’ve been fucking him for a good fifteen of those. Oh and let’s not forget you  _live with him_.”

“And?” Tenzou deflected again, although this time feeling slightly helpless.

“ _And_ ,” Genma drew out. “All I’m saying is unlike you, Kakashi isn’t blind.”

When Tenzou didn’t respond, instead choosing to mutely stare into his burnt, awful tasting beverage, Genma loudly sighed again and stood up, clearly exasperated.

“You think he doesn’t see it, but hell Tenzou, even _I_  saw it the moment you walked in the door. You’re putting yourself through collective misery again, and it’s like you’re wondering how many kids it will take to die to show you that your idealized dogma of what it means to be loyal to this village has abandoned you. Don’t do this yourself. Tell Kakashi. Retire. Hell, why do you think I go out when I did?”

There was silence, and then, unapologetically:

“Because you wanted to kill plants instead?”

“ _You_ —,” Genma sighed, shaking his head and pointing towards the door, “—get out.  _Go._  Go tell him.”

“ _What_ —Genma, I was kidding—,”

“—like I’ve said, I’ve never tried to understand your relationship with that man, but for the love of god, you really do love to torture yourself. Go on now, you’ll feel better, I swear. It’s not like he’s going to dump you because you want to quit your day job.”

Tenzou blinked, and wordlessly he collected himself, exiting Genma’s apartment with a small shove.

“And next time, you better clean yourself up before coming here!” the other man shouted after him. “My apartment smells  _awful!_ ”

\---

Tenzou had never liked the idea that shinobi were tools—that was, that they were disposable husks meant to be used, broken, and then thrown away.

Two weeks past visiting Genma, he had summoned the courage to visit the Memorial Stone and discovered that the kid’s name with the avian-like mask (the one who had died under his command—the one who had looked like Sai and Naruto and Sakura) was named Aki Amori. He found out that Aki didn’t have a family and that he had graduated from the academy at age seven and that since becoming an orphan at age four, he had been pushed through the system doing the only kind thing that Konahagakure knew how to do to care for the parentless children of dead shinobi. The kindness that the village had provided was to give kids like Aki a purpose in life with empty meaning; a chance to be  _something—_ another tool to be used _—_ through means of stark and irreconcilable violence.

Tenzou thought it was sad that this was the way things were and as he sighed, staring mutely at the darkened, long standing stone, the truth lodged bitter-tasting in his throat. The sight of the kid’s name—Aki, Aki,  _Aki_ —brought back every silly mantra that academy teacher’s like that damn fool Iruka espoused to the orphans of their small village about how it was an honorable thing to be made into a tool for the sake of their supposed safety.

He wondered how they did it without feeling guilty—how men like Iruka told mere children through serene albeit disquieted, hollow eyes that the reforming of their life paths towards the hierarchy or shinobi ethics was a  _good_  thing (as if a life without violence would somehow make them lesser) and again Tenzou sighed, realizing that it was all lies.

Men like Iruka lied because they figured that the children were better off not knowing the truth for a while and that in doing so, they were preserving the innocence of their youth for that much longer. Men like Iruka lied so that the product in the mold of hands would always be the perfectly functioning tools that would serve as the stalwart garrison for their ongoing peace (or wars) of the land—whichever came with each flippant turn of the political wheel, Tenzou supposed.

And they would be tools until they were not, Tenzou thought quietly. Because all tools would break eventually, and he knew that the academy teachers preferred it to be later rather than sooner. The months—years—decades it took for each and every shinobi to soak in the blood of their own fresh, personal tragedy (and final awakening) gave them time. And yes, while he knew that every tragedy was tragic—that every death that he had ever witnessed was tragic in its own quiet way—the teachers at the academy did their jobs so well that even Tenzou, a ROOT brat, had fallen into the same crude trap.

All lies and truth were swallowed of course, and he had still yet to tell Kakashi that he wanted to retire.

He hated the truth and when he returned to the quiet emptiness of their mid-town apartment later that afternoon, all he could do was sit in silent meditation and pour himself into the nothingness while his skinned crawled with a vibrating uneasiness.  

When Kakashi returned home late, the other man found Tenzou sitting quietly in the this same position, his eyes tempered shut in the dying evening light.

Guilty, Tenzou made them supper, which they ate while enduring idle, meaningless conversation. They did not speak of their jobs or their missions or the growing rift that was floating between them. Instead, the patterns of their words felt all too familiar and Tenzou felt that as of late they had slipped into some strange borderline state that teetered endlessly between them falling apart and simply just falling.

Tenzou knew this was his fault. He knew his refusal to speak candidly about how he truly felt about his enduring tenure as one of the village’s operatives meant that Kakashi would eventually stop asking him about how his missions went. It was simply the way the other man was—he didn’t push and he didn’t pry—but it didn’t stop Tenzou from feeling overwhelming guilty when Kakashi’s eyes fell flat and silent with disappointment with every one of Tenzou’s reoccurring refusals to be open with the other man.

“It went fine,” he would tell Kakashi. Or, “things went well”.

And these lies, these common, habitual lies were all too visible—a growing monster that sat deadened in their sitting room—and when they went to bed that night, with Tenzou’s fingers whispering quietly up his lovers waiting inner thighs, his mind separated. It separated and alighted a situation in his mind as he dully realized that his deceptively gentle caress was that of a viper, lying in wait as he slowly poisoned the best thing that had ever happened to him.

In between heady kisses, Tenzou tried to think back to the beginning of how this had all started, but he could only imagine Kakashi’s rare smiles that slipped beneath his barriers in the midst of every battle and tumultuous scars that he carried home, too foolish to stop the blinding hilt of a katana as he desperately fought to save those who could not save themselves. When this mindset of saving people had become so deeply entrenched within himself (tearing at the depths of his stomach with roiling roots that were slow in their creeping suffocation) he could not say, but that kid Aki—Aki Amori—was most definitely the tipping point that had sent him irreversibly spiralling into the deep end.

Tenzou knew one thing, however. He knew that he wanted this all to stop. But as he tried each and every day to pull out the uneasiness that was growing heavy in chest, trying desperately to find a new identity that was beyond the porcelain veneer of a tell-tale mask, he only felt ever distant from not only Kakashi, but from himself.  

Mid-stroke, Kakashi came and Tenzou’s heart clicked into place, forming an inaudible melody that he knew he knew he would never stop loving. It was just a shame that the wonderful sensation was always followed by those unrepentant, undulating waves of guilt and building self-scorn, as nothing felt worse than knowing that as a pair, the two of them were coming apart at the seams.     

\---

It was an early Thursday afternoon and Tenzou found himself at the Yamanaka’s flower shop with Genma, idly perusing a menagerie of exotic plants. Despite Genma’s insistence that he hadn’t killed  _as many_  plants as of late, the ones he had currently picked out for purchase Tenzou quietly deemed to be far too complicated to care for by the likes of his eager companion.

Their trips together to the flower shop had become a strange routine. They had occurred when Genma, sharp as ever, had ascertained quite easily that Tenzou had in fact  _not_ taken his advice to tell Kakashi about his wish to retire (in fact, it had required very little mental acumen at all as Genma, on one of his weekly flower runs to the Yamanaka’s shop, had happened to catch sight of Tenzou post-mission returning tired and weary through the far East Gate). Since then, Genma had dragged Tenzou across town twice in the past two weeks for what Tenzou could only conclude as a purposeful chance to silently goad him.

“This one’s my favorite,” Genma smiled sharply, greedily eying an expensive orchid with red and white blooms. “I’ve gotten it to last 3 weeks before, which Ino tells me is pretty good considering the first one I ever bought died within days.”

Tenzou heavily sighed and tried to direct his Genm’as attention towards a plant that was less... _complicated_ …to look after.

“What about this one?” he tried carefully. It was a common green jade plant, currently in full bloom with delicate white flowers. Despite its simplicity, Tenzou knew that this particular specimen was naturally hardy and drought resistant and required little to no watering.

Unfortunately, it didn’t matter. Genma didn’t like the jade plant, rhyming off an airy: “It’s too plain, Tenzou,” before moving down the row.

Half an hour later, a pleasantly paid Ino bid the pair goodbye, their arms filled with a bevy of potted plants that Tenzou couldn’t help but to feel sorry for. The pair walked in silence, Tenzou gingerly carrying Genma’s prized orchid, while his friend carried both a lone potted pink amaryllis belladonna and small red flowering hibiscus bush. The walk across town was stifling in the hot summer heat, the temperatures soaring into the mid-forties and it wasn’t long before Genma suggested they take a detour, promising Tenzou that the extra bit of time they spent walking with the plants would be worth it.

Fifteen minutes later, the pair found themselves on the outskirts of town with the welcoming shade of the lofty surrounding forest near the South Gate. Out here, the air was admittedly cooler, the stifling early September heat tampered by the cool forest breeze and shaded by the tall overarching canopy that covered the rough dirt road with its deep rutted grooves from travelling merchant wagons that came from Cha no Kuni in the south. Genma hummed idly as they continued on and eventually they found themselves nearing an old wooden fence that peeked out inconspicuously from the tall summer grass. Beyond the fence was an overgrown farmers field, and as they kept walking, the field turned into a gnarled orchard that sat next to an old farmstead.

“You remember this place, don’t you Tenzou?” Genma chuckled lightly, opening the farm gate with the old for sale sign and sauntering up to the sagging wooden steps of the dilapidated house. He set down his two potted plants and eased himself onto the shaded steps under the creaking veranda roof, untying the dark blue bandana from his head and wiping a thin sheen of sweat from his face.

“The old Hamura estate,” Tenzou whistled lightly, following suit and sitting himself down on the steps. “I haven’t been out here in years…” he added quietly.

“We used to make sure we passed by it at least once a year, every spring coming back from our missions,” Genma said brightly. “Kakashi made a point of it, especially when the cherry trees in the orchard were in bloom.”

Tenzou smiled softly—he did remember the long walks Kakashi had taken the team on down the old dirt road—and he also remembered the cherry trees blooming with a vivid sort of intensity that sent him reeling back in youthful blanket of nostalgia.

Silently, he thought back to the farm which had been a gorgeous sight to see, especially mid-summer when the vegetable crops were teeming with life and the cherry trees near ripe and readying to be sent to market. Sadly, the farmland now was nothing but overgrown fields with wildflowers—even the orchard had grown wild; the mangled, untended trees barely clinging to life due to years of neglect.

If Tenzou remembered correctly, old man Hamura had died sometime when he was in his late teens and the farmstead had sat empty ever since.

“On earth there is no heaven, Tenzou,” Genma went on to teasingly say, aged eyes scanning the horizon.  “But there are pieces of it. Old man Hamura’s farm was one of those pieces. Too bad it’s gone to ruin.”

Tenzou found himself biting his lip.

“It _could_ be fixed up,” he tried doubtingly, remembering the vibrant market stall Hamura’s wife had run in town. The old woman had always been so kind, especially to his younger self, and he fondly recalled her always filling his bag with extra produce, claiming that he was too small and scrawny for his age.

“Maybe,” Genma responded speculatively. He chewed absently on the senbon needle hanging from his lips before enunciating a sharp: “But who would want an old place like this? None of the kids these days even remember it, and it’s not like you or I are even close to being farmers.”

Tenzou found himself humming quietly, pulling himself into the farmstead as he leaned in quiet reverie against the old rotting wood pole of the veranda. It wouldn’t be a bad place to live, a sudden albeit quiet thought told him. Maybe with a few months of work, the house would be livable again…and those cherry trees; well, if they were pruned and cared for carefully, they might even bloom again one day. 

“They say the first shinobi were farmers,” Tenzou then let out conversationally, eyes quietly searching the overrun fields of tall grass and winding wild flowers. “So maybe we’re not so far off as you think.”

“Is that so?” Genma hummed in amusement, a lazy smile creeping its way onto his tired, sweaty face.

“It is,” Tenzou smiled gently. He wiped his brow and exhaled lightly, relishing in the cool shade that old farm house had to offer.  “Old man Hamura told me so, once upon a time,” he then laughed. “He said that the first shinobi were sons of the earth and that they rose up against the violence and chaos of the early lands, sharpening their trowels in the same way they sharpened their wills, unrelenting in their goal to create a peaceful world in which they could farm the land without bloodshed.”

Again Genma let out a small laugh, eyes crinkling as he smiled.

“Old man Hamura also said that it was the Sun King who made his crops grow, giving birth to new life,” he said pointedly. “ _Not_ his hard work or the water that he irrigated his fields with from the old well out back. Now please Tenzou, don’t tell me you actually believe in all that sort of stuff now, or has all this talk of retirement lately really gotten to your head?”

Tenzou didn’t respond immediately, mere blinked and inhaled deeply. The listless summer heat seemed lessened out here, as did the routine hustle that made up the busy, bustling streets of Konohagakure. Time as it were, was suspended. There were no missions and no shinobi, no honour or integrity or duty to the village, just endless trees and the overwhelming comforting scent of the forest, carried gently by a warm, calming breeze.

An unanticipated smile then spread evenly across his face, for oddly enough he couldn’t help but to never want to leave it.

“ _No_ ,” Tenzou said at long last, finally rising to go. “I don’t. But old man Hamura did, and it seemed like he lived a fairly good life, don’t you think?”

To this, Genma nodded quietly in candid agreement.

“We’ll come back soon,” the other man remarked idly, standing to go as well. “It’s less out hot here. Maybe next time we go back to Yamanaka’s eh?”

Tenzou nodded and silently the pair then began the arduous walk back into town, their potted plants slowly withering in the oppressive summer heat.

\---

The small used bookshop he liked near the market district, the one tucked quietly behind Izanami’s teahouse, smelled like dust and moldy paper. It was a quiet store, with old books and tattered scrolls lining the shelves from wall to wall, extending upwards into the high reaches of the ceiling and beyond. There was a certain charm to it that Tenzou had found likable some years ago and when it came to finding unique and rare books on architecture, the store had never once failed him.

On this morning he had been perusing the dust-lined shelves for a good hour, a handful of carefully selected books in hand and he was currently leafing through a bin of old scrolls; almanacs from years gone by. A lot of them were hand written and some near eligible, but Tenzou found that they were exceptionally useful when it came to predicting seasonal changes. According to the ones he had purchased the week previous, the summer heat wave would soon be ending and as a marker for the hot September temperatures they had been experiencing, the almanacs appeared to be relatively accurate (plus or minus a few degrees). He was in the middle of carefully unravelling a particularly aged scroll with curling, crumbling edges when a familiar albeit tentative sounding voice interrupted him.

“Yamato-taichou?”

Tenzou abruptly turned and found his former student, Sai, smiling easily at him, the younger man holding onto an old singular book which he carried close to his chest.

 “Sai—,” Tenzou breathed back easily, trying to remember the last time it had been since he had seen him. It had been a while, he ruminated. Normally, he would have met up with his former student’s for ramen once or twice a month due to Naruto’s timely insistence, but when he thought about it carefully, he hadn’t seen Naruto in quite some time either. “It’s good to see you,” he finished genially. “How have you been?”

“It’s good to see you too, taichou,” Sai said brightly, and then, carefully, he raised the book in his hand for Tenzou to see. The dusty, tattered cover simply said:  _Blooming in Adversity: Childrearing and Shinobi._

“Sai…” Tenzou started off slowly, trying to ascertain as to why Sai would be purchasing a book on parenting. Then suddenly it dawned on him and broke into a grin.

“Ino is pregnant,” Sai stated evenly before Tenzou could begin to ask. “She suggested that I find a book on it for myself and I remembered that you spent a lot of time in this particular book store when we were younger.”

Slowly, Tenzou blinked. Any congratulatory notions that had been forthcoming faded away in a slurring dip of confusion.

“Well Sai, I’ve been coming to Etsuko’s for years,” he started off gradually, brows deeply furrowed. “But I don’t think I ever took you three here—,”

“—we use to follow you and Kakashi-sensei around a lot after the war,” Sai smiled brightly, his grin unnervingly even.

Tenzou sighed through a disapproving smile, bringing his free fingers to the bridge of his nose as he closed his eyes.

“ _Sai_ ,” Tenzou said calmly, his hand dropping back to his side. “How many times did we tell you three that stalking people is wrong?”

“Oh don’t worry, Yamato-taichou,” Sai chuckled lightly. “We stopped when we caught Kakashi-sensei giving you a blowjob near—,”

“— _Sai_ ,” Tenzou cut his former student off sharply. Despite this, he felt his cheeks colour brightly and again, he sighed.

“What books do you have then, taichou?” Sai then asked curiously, moving forward from the awkward conversation effortlessly and pointing to the bundle books Tenzou had tucked beneath his left arm.

“ _Ah_ ,” Tenzou said quietly, thankful for the easy distraction. He lifted the three books he had selected and showed them to the young man.

“Gardening books,” Sai said bluntly, his tone surprisingly dull. The bright smile on his face had creeped into a look of confusion and then speculatively he asked: “Yamato-taichou, I know this may seem like a strange question, but why would  _you_ need books on gardening?”

Tenzou blinked, but then an easy: “I like to read, Sai,” rolled off his tongue, followed by: “And knowing the biology of a plant helps me create them with better efficiency.”

Sai pondered this momentarily, but seemed to accept Tenzou’s answer, a smile once again returning to the young man’s pale, angular face.

“Have you seen Naruto around lately?” Tenzou continued on conversationally, thinking of the other member of their small family that he hadn’t heard from in what must have been a good month. He began heading towards the cash register near the back of the shop, the almanacs forgotten. “He normally drops by the apartment at least a few times a month to have me buy him ramen, but I haven’t—“—he paused, thinking to how he had been avoiding the apartment as of late and he bit his tongue—“— _well_. I haven’t seen him around,” he corrected himself.

Sai had followed in turn and Tenzou noted as he shook his head with a slight “ _no_ ”, setting his singular book down on the counter to be paid for.

“I haven’t either,” Sai said puzzlingly. “But Sakura-chan says he’s been spending a lot of time with—,”

“—that will 50 ryo,” an abrupt young girl—the store owner’s granddaughter—said to Sai, cutting off their conversation.

Sai paused before nodding, a small “ _ah_ ”, slipping out of his mouth and he then pulled out a few bills from his pocket, setting them carefully on the counter. The young girl took them, handing Sai his change and then turned her attention to Tenzou.

“For those three, let’s say 100 ryo,” she rhymed off quickly, eyes scanning the books Tenzou held under his arm. Tenzou nodded and handed the girl the exact amount and the pair made their way out of the quiet, dusty store and into the small crowded alleyway.

“So a baby,” Tenzou said kindly, noticeably pleased as the pair walked down the shaded alley, dipping beneath store canopies, avoiding the mid-morning sun.

“Yes,” Sai smiled kindly. “I found out this morning.”

“Well, I’m happy for you, Sai,” Tenzou told the young man earnestly, placing a firm hand on his former student’s shoulder.

“Well to be honest, Yamato-taichou,” Sai said quietly, lowering his voice to a near inaudible whisper and leaning in close. “I think Ino simply couldn’t stand the fact that Sakura was pregnant and she wasn’t.”

Tenzou in turn found himself blinking, then laughing, and when he had stopped, Sai was still smiling quietly, clutching the old book on parenthood tightly to his chest.

“C’mon Sai,” Tenzou said lightly, leading them out of the alleyway and into the main market street. “Let’s go to Izanami’s—you can tell me everything over lunch. My treat.”

\---

The aromatic tea and light lunch of pickled root vegetables with Sai at Izanami’s teahouse had been pleasingly nice and Tenzou had evenly promised the young man that he would try and see him again soon, perhaps accompanying him back to Etsuko’s in order to help him find another book on parenting. After he had carefully flipped through the tired looking volume that Sai had purchased hours earlier, Tenzou had grown mildly concerned at the quality of the text. Openly, he had advised his former student that while the books at Etsuko’s were second to none in terms of their uniqueness, it would perhaps be more prudent to purchase a more modern volume on parenting, one with information that not only pertained to this current century, but one with advice that also did _not_ advocate giving an infant child small doses poison in order to build up an immunity at an early age.

Sai had taken this advice duly, admitting that he had been skeptical in purchasing such an old book, but agreed enthusiastically to accompany Tenzou back to the small store in the future, offhandedly noting that he had seen quite a few interesting volumes of old art prints that he thought had looked quite promising.

After parting ways, Tenzou had soon found himself back at his and Kakashi’s apartment, openly relishing in the quiet solitude that the empty space had to offer. Relaxing on the bed in the soft light of the afternoon sun, he opened the old books he had purchased earlier, idly if not steadfastly flipping through their worn pages, fingers tracing the dusty, dirt laden paper that had once belonged to a local farmer, or if not, the farmer’s wayward son.

Reading them he felt calm, and for once he did not think of the weeks that had occurred between then and now. He did not think about how the walls of their apartment were a constant reminder of his undying shortcomings. He did not think of how Kakashi had disappointed him, because like always, the other man did not mention Tenzou’s steadfast silence and discernible half-truths, even if the empty spaces that now existed between them were now louder than most things that they had ever done together. The fact was, Tenzou refused to wish anymore (for the other man to notice what was happening to them or even if he had, to perhaps simply _push_ him in the right direction for once) but he also knew that this was being unfair to him, because the silence floating between them was not Kakashi’s fault in his entirety .

With the flip of a page, he did not think about how they were both there to witness every ribcage-hollowing loss and newfangled desperation of their dying relationship and how it wasn’t actually all that new at all. He did not think about every lost word and Kakashi’s sideways glances of fleeting desperation that brought forth aching guilt in his bones or how all of this could be solved so simply by speaking with other candidly instead of conversing through veiled smiles and dusty, rehearsed intonations that felt like something akin to the instructions he was reading in his gardening books.

As the afternoon wore on, the daylight dimmed and his brown eyes flashed in the orange-red setting sun of their bedroom window, so bright and promising. Still, his stomach stirred, fluttering with that familiar albeit unwanted wave of uneasiness. The fact that he had always been lauded as being a brilliant and knowledgeable man did not matter and Tenzou heedlessly hide the dusty tomes from Etsuko’s on the bookshelf in their bedroom behind his proper collection of texts on architecture. When he was finished with that task he then set about making something for them for Kakashi’s birthday supper.

Late, Kakashi came home and they quietly ate the meal, sharing nominal tokens of their now divided days.

“Find anything interesting at the market this morning?” the other man asked placidly after Tenzou had offered him a small gift and a kiss on the cheek, murmuring a quiet: “Happy birthday” when their supper was finished.  In turn, Tenzou shook his head, taking a slow sip of lukewarm tea.

“Just a few more books on old Senju-Era architecture,” he responded with purposeful dishonesty. “However, Etsuko’s granddaughter was at the store today, and so was Sai.”

Kakashi murmured a quiet “ _mmhmm_ ,” taking in a steady sip of the tea Tenzou had prepared for them, and together they yielded to the wieldy silence of their apartment, the setting sun now all but gone and leaving nothing but the cold and unnatural light of the kitchen’s dim fluorescence. 

\---

The farm was quiet and dusty, the creaky estate baking quietly in the hot summer sun. It settled and sighed all around him, and as he sat on the steps of the old, decrepit house, the air around him smelled musky and wet. The off-coloured scent of rotting timber that hadn’t quiet dried out since the last rainy season permeated the air in abundance, but oddly enough Tenzou found the smell comforting.

This was not the first time he had visited the old farm in the past few days and he theorized it would not be the last.

Out here, on the outskirts of the village, everything seemed unfamiliar. The tall foliage of the forest was breathing in life all around him, and as he scanned the overgrown fields, once teaming with carefully cropped vegetable plots that he remembered vaguely from his youth, he couldn’t help but to feel blind. For beyond all his merit and worth as an esteemed member of the jounin community, he really didn’t know a _thing_  about their village beyond the routine culling of youth towards the greater hierarchical schema that was shinobi.

This farm had once been a part of it. This farm—or rather, this abandoned homestead that had belonged to the old Hamura clan—had once supplied the local market with fresh produce. It had once had cucumbers and eggplants, shishitō peppers and kobacha squash. It had once had napa cabbage and asatsuki chives, sweet potatoes and lotus stems. It had once had daikon roots and taro stalks, all of which grew heartily near the roadside. He remembered this. He remembered this and thought it might be nice if somehow this expansive piece of land somehow became functional again.

But he also recalled the orchard. He remembered the trees and the dozens upon dozens of rows that bloomed vibrantly in cascades of white and pink buds, spreading winding blossoms akimbo for those few short weeks in the spring. The fields would be covered in the blooms and with the right shift of the wind, the delicate petals would float slowly into town, settling in the streets and decorating the roadsides with their soft, colorful scatterings.

The trees Tenzou observed sadly, were now dormant with gnarled, branches empty due to years of neglect. They barely produced enough foliage to cover their spindly black outcroppings and he didn’t see singular piece of fruit on their low hanging branches. The truth was, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen the cherry trees bloom, but again, he also thought it might be nice if they did.

Quietly, he took a deep breath and sighed.

Like always, he ended up sitting on the steps of the old Hamura estate for quite some time, basking in the sun and feeling his body settle into the old sagging steps, pulling in the property’s energy and feeling almost uncannily at ease. He closed his eyes and listened to the unbounding silence of the forest, tampered by the airy calls of summer sparrows and the vibrating humming of the dense cicadas. He let out a breath, and then another, and when he opened his eyes, he was at peace.

He couldn’t explain the feeling to anyone. There was an unmitigated intensity to it all—something unfastened and intrinsic in the way he could relax with the unbounding knowledge that all around him was nothing but a forgotten farmstead, lost to the forest and quietly returning to the earth. It was a feeling of transcendence—something above what he felt with the monotony and uneasiness with his routine in the ANBU, spending his time in such a cavalier manner of violence and unimportance, as if that alone would give him purpose in old age. It didn’t, but something out here, on the edge of the forest near the outskirts of town gave him the thought that maybe a life here might.

With little reserve, he thought that Genma might understand this,  _sort of_ , if he tried hard enough to explain himself. Maybe, he thought idly, that was why Genma had retired. He wondered if the other man had just woken up one morning and felt as if he was done with the systemic way in with Konohagakure idly threw away his life, and the lives of others, to the wind. Was that why he went out and started buying plants and making coffee for casual guests in the morning? And how was it that he—Kinoe—Yamato— _Tenzou_ —was now being compelled in the same direction?

He pressed his hands into the damp and rotting boards of the stoop he was sitting on, feeling the overwhelming moisture leaking from the untreated wood of years gone by. He didn’t move when the pain in his arm spread upwards, the ache in his shoulder jarring and crooked, the limb sitting unevenly in the curve of the socket. Then, as he dipped his head low, taking in another breath of dry summer air, he let go.

He was tired and hungry. His feet hurt from walking and running countless miles back to town after his last mission and despite the tranquility that the abandoned farmstead offered him, he knew that this feeling couldn’t last.

Admittedly, he never took himself as the type of person to fall apart so easily, but after the days and months and years of throwing himself towards a sunless future, he now knew he truly wanted one where he could bask in the light and feel as though he had control over the plot of dirt where he would finally die. He wanted that future and he wanted it so badly because he was tired of watching kids like Aki go senselessly and needlessly and stupidly because they were trained to think that dying for the sake of the village was a good thing. Out here, in the woods there was none of that; there was no fighting aimlessly against faceless demons and there was no unwarranted death—just crops that blossomed and withered with the turn of each season, only to find themselves reborn in spring, rising tall with the summer sun king.

Momentarily, his thoughts turned to Kakashi, and the man’s last words to him before he had taken off on his latest mission, silent and unwilling to tell him any of the finite details.

“Why are you doing this?” Kakashi had simply asked.

Tenzou couldn’t think of a real answer that would satisfy him and so he said nothing, hugged the other man closely and left.

He sighed and leaned his head against the crooked wooden pillar holding up the veranda to his left. He thought of going of home, right there and then, and waiting for Kakashi to return in order to tell the other man that he was sorry. That he was sorry and that he had been the one letting them fall apart and break into a quietly dying void. He thought of telling the other man that he was right—he  _had_  been avoiding him—but as Genma had pointed out all those years ago, Tenzou had always failed at those necessary, important  _human_  things that mattered.

Communication as it were, was not his strong suit.

He thought of doing all these things and instead did nothing. Rather, he closed his eyes again, letting the warm summer breeze lull him into a false sense of security and easy rest.

When he blinked again, the sun was setting in the west. Wearily he stood, gingerly clutching his swollen, dislocated arm and began the slow walk back in to town.

\---

Sakura was oddly patient throughout the medical procedure and despite the late hour, she was gentle and quiet as she studiously examined the bruised and uneven mass that made up the length of his shoulder area. Pliant fingers pressed lightly into the jarred apex of the limb, as though her enduring pregnancy had somehow mellowed her normally bold and ferocious bedside manner. Despite this, it could not prevent Tenzou from wincing sharply when her index finger tentatively prodded the uneven mass that connected limb to body.

“How did this happen, Yamato-taichou?” she asked him uniformly, pulling away and picking up her clipboard.

Tenzou sighed and chose the easiest of truths, settling for the obvious.

“Latest mission,” he told her with gradual guilt. “Classified, of course.”

Sakura in turn hummed quietly, scratching something quickly onto his medical report and set the clipboard down.

“Your shoulder is badly dislocated,” she announced fastidiously at long last. “I want to tell you it will be a painless fix, but unfortunately it’s quite swollen.”

Tenzou nodded in easy understanding and waited patiently for Sakura to do her worst.

Cool, delicate hands rested firmly against the curve of his shoulder, one hand grasping the length of his upper arm where the fading ANBU tattoo rested in bold, red ink and the other pressed flat into the plane of his back.

“Deep breath, Yamato-taichou,” she instructed methodically. Tenzou inhaled, and Sakura’s once delicate touch becoming potent, slamming the dislocated limb back into place with an unnatural snap. Tenzou let out a sharp exhale, blinking back tears through gritted teeth and Sakura smiled at him sympathetically.

“All done,” she announced. She picked her clipboard back up and began writing a small note in the file again before setting it back down and pulling out a small pad of paper.

“I want you taking naproxen for the swelling,” she told him firmly, scribbling down her instructions on the piece of paper meant for him to take home. “Twice a day, with bedrest. That means  _no more_  missions for at least a week or two,” she added pointedly. She set the small piece of paper down next to him on the examination table and pulled open a drawer on the cabinet next to the door. “I’m going to wrap your arm in a sling as well if that’s okay with you, Yamato-taichou,” she then added kindly, if not tentatively, as if Tenzou would somehow refuse.

Tenzou simply nodded and Sakura smiled quietly, retrieving a gauzy length of cloth.

“I’m afraid resetting your arm has caused more bruising,” she continued on, careful eyes narrowly examining the length of his now smooth shoulder blade. “Icing it will do you good for the pain, but try to keep your arm in the sling for at least the first few days.”

Again Tenzou nodded murmuring a small: “Thank you, Sakura.”

Unravelling the roll of cloth, Sakura began folding it appropriately to make a triangular sling and Tenzou hummed, blinking uncomfortably under the sterile, white lights.

“Arm tight to your chest,” she instructed, slipping the material beneath his forearm. Tenzou complied and Sakura pulled the fabric tight, meeting the ends around the curve of his neck.

“Sakura…” Tenzou began quietly. Sakura momentarily still as she tied the cloth ends into a tight knot, deft fingers pulling steadily on the fabric. Then, she moved again, before letting out an inquisitive:

“Yes, Yamato-taichou?”

With the sling firmly secured, she returned to his front, and picked up her clipboard for a third time and made another quick note.

“Have you ever seen the old Hamura estate?” he asked her, watching in quiet disinterest as she scribbled quickly on the paperwork.

Again, Sakura stilled, the scribbling coming to an abrupt stop. The pen came to her lips and she tapped in lightly before letting out a small, tempered smiled.

“Of course,” she smiled brightly. “No one lives there, but when we were children we used to run around in the abandoned fields, playing games in the wild flowers.”

Tenzou nodded sagely, quietly, and Sakura’s lips birth another small smile. Then, she sat down next to him in the chair next to examination table.

“Everything there has gone to ruins though,” she added as a pointed afterthought. “Even the house is falling apart.”

“I remember when it used to an actual farm,” Tenzou told her kindly, a small smile matching the young woman’s.

“Then you must be very old then, Yamato-taichou,” Sakura joked, eyes crinkling into tiny lidded half-moons.

“I’m only in my mid-thirties,” Tenzou exhaled, chuckling lightly.

“I know,” Sakura smiled. “I do have access to your medical files these days,” she said in amusement, smooth fingers pressing firmly into the large manila-coloured folder that sat next to the clipboard on the table. “It’s funny though, taichou, because when we were younger, Naruto, Sai and myself used to argue about how old you really were,” she continued on.

“You did?” Tenzou chuckled in return.

“ _Yes_ ,” Sakura said softly, slyly. “We always thought you must be ages older than Kakashi-sensei because you always acted like such a fussy, old man.”

Tenzou balked and shook his head in disbelief, laughing softly.

“Again Sakura, I’m only thirty-four.”

“I know,” she replied kindly. “But to group of fifteen year old kids, you seemed so… _so_ …”

“—Wise and let’s not forget your esteemed team captain,” Tenzou interjected firmly.

Sakura smiled softly again and nodded.

“Yes, Yamato-taichou,” she grinned. “Let’s go with that.”

The pair fell into silence and Tenzou hummed idly, experimentally splaying his fingers to ensure that all movement had been returned to his otherwise stiff and swollen arm. Sakura, taking note, had returned to her clipboard and made another short observation before setting it back down.

“Yamato-taichou,” she then started, tone increasingly forward and intuitive. “Do you think  _you’d_  like to live on a farm one day?”

Tenzou stilled and was silent momentarily. Rapidly, he thought to the Hamura estate and how his world was a mess right now. He thought of Kakashi and their unending, enduring silences, and of the unrelenting heatwaves of the Konohagakure summer season with all the dead children buried beneath its endless warmth. He thought of Genma, who despite everything wrong he ever said or did, always seemed to be unrelenting right. And lastly, he thought of Aki, who had Sakura’s eyes and Sai’s hair and Naruto’s smile, and of the all the kids in the academy who were taught in that decidedly traitorous way that it was somehow alright that someone as young as Aki Amori had died.

He thought of this all, but did not dare say or mention any of it. Instead, he turned his attention back to Sakura and let out a deceptively calm:

“I think it would be nice.”

In that moment, Sakura smiled brightly—it was a huge, marvellous smile that made Tenzou’s chest clench tight at the extensively apparent happiness that was beaming from her face, so white and pure that it nearly lit up the entirety of the room. It was a smile so brilliant that it almost seemed like she was overwhelming  _happy_ that he was in fact considering burying the title of shinobi in the deep rich soil of the farmland on the outskirts of town.

“We could all come and visit!” Sakura then said easily, still smiling. “And they—,”—she touched her growing stomach gently—“—our kids that is,” she said. “Could play in the fields like we used to when we were children.”

Tenzou smiled softly and nodded, but couldn’t help but add: “It’s just a dream, Sakura.”

“But it’s a nice one,” the young woman conceded genially.

Tenzou nodded carefully, agreeing with her. It was a nice dream, he thought speculatively. He blinked, thinking to the farm he remembered from his youth and when he opened his eyes Sakura was standing near the door, waiting to escort him out.

“Come, taichou,” she said to him. “It’s late and Kakashi-sensei is probably waiting up for you.”

\---

Sakura was indeed correct in her conjecture: despite the late hour Kakashi was patiently waiting for him, although his concern was quietly hidden by means of the book he was reading in the small light of the sitting room. Tenzou, weary and sore, slowly made his way through their small apartment and chose to ignore the other man’s raised brow at the sight of Tenzou’s arm in the sling. Instead, he sat down next to him, settling in easily to the old, worn couch.

“Something happen on the mission?” Kakashi then asked evenly, setting down his book into the slope of his lap.

Tenzou sighed, but did not expound. His mouth opened slowly, but then it closed, and Tenzou wondered what, if anything, Kakashi thought of this. He looked up and momentarily saw hard lines etched firmly into the hollows of the other man’s cheeks, eyes tired and bloodshot, visible darkened beneath the curve of his grey, grey eyes. He saw tight lips and resignation, clear as day in each defeated exhale steadily thrumming with the rise and fall of his chest. Kakashi too was tired in his own silent way and Tenzou blinked, knowing absently that this tiredness was in part also his fault.

Guilt-ridden and full of absolution, he tried to speak again, but found himself looking away, too ashamed to continue on. Admittedly tired, he instead found himself leaning quietly into Kakashi’s shoulder, head resting gently on the curve of his arm.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured, his voice nearly inaudible, but the other man said nothing. Kakashi simply pulled Tenzou close, careful in his movements as to avoid jostling his injured arm and faintly, he nodded. Tenzou closed his eyes and let out another lengthy breath.

Quietly, silently, Tenzou knew through mere touch alone that this was it. He knew this because of the quietly desperate ply of his lovers shaking fingers that firmly clasped the curve of his shoulder. He knew this because of the embrace itself, which had locked them in an unnervingly close albeit silent state of unease. It was now or never, because he _knew_ that somethings they were not meant to come back from.

They sat like this for a long time, quiet in the dim light of their old apartment. Eventually, Tenzou found that Kakashi felt calm in the embrace, his breathing slowed and gentle like soft summer breeze. Determined, he then tried one last time.

“Kakashi?” he started softly, pulling away.

The other man stirred ever so slightly, but did not respond. Tenzou bit his lip, sighing faintly and continued on, hoping that the other man was truly listening.

 “I think… I think I’m going to retire,” he told the other man clearly, visibly, truthfully. Again there was silence and Tenzou’s chest felt unnaturally tight.

“I think it’s time,” he added quietly, fingers curling and uncurling in the palm of his hand. “It’s been time for a while. I just don’t…”—he exhaled anxiety, eyes falling downward to the curve of his lap—“…I don’t know where it leaves me,” he said softly, mostly to himself. “I don’t know what I’m going to do—what  _we’re_ going to do. And I know I’m losing you and I know it’s my fault” he said, his voice quietly desperate. “But I don’t know how to fix it.”

The words rung out bluntly, hanging thick in the air and sitting quietly in the deadened space between them. There was no response, no anything, and Tenzou, undone by the situation, felt incredibly lost. For beneath the entirety of all of his aimlessness, for all these lost weeks, he had been truly hoping that Kakashi would understand. He had hoped…

Well, that didn’t matter now, did it?

“I’m sorry, senpai,” he said one last time. Kakashi, while visibly quiet with closed eyes closed and gentle breathing, suddenly pulled Tenzou in again and murmured a soft: “I know, Tenzou. I know.”

Tenzou’s fingers pulled at the call of Kakashi’s snaking hand, the other squeezing them together tight as if he was all too scared that somehow Tenzou would suddenly up and disappear.

“I’m glad,” the other man suddenly told him through a sleepy mumble.

Tenzou didn’t know what this meant, if anything, and couldn’t find the words to ask. He didn’t want to know.

Soon, they went to bed and when Tenzou woke up the next morning, sore and anxious, Kakashi had already left to start his day.

\---

It was a week passed and Tenzou found himself standing in front of the old Hamura estate in the early morning rain, crest fallen. The sign of sale had disappeared and Tenzou was reminded of Kakashi and of all the things the other man didn’t say to him. He didn’t say: “It’s okay.” He didn’t say: “We’ll figure this out.” He didn’t say: “Don’t go.” He didn’t say: “Leave.”

Tenzou had left anyways, and as he stood in front of the old farmstead, scrutinizing the sign post where the sign of sale had once been, he realized that he was too late. In his idleness, somebody had purchased the estate and Tenzou was left wondering about all the things Kakashi didn’t say and the things he did and was helplessly trying to figure out if he meant any of them at all.

(When it had happened, their apartment had been quiet. Around them had been only the tiniest wisps of air, carried effortlessly from each other’s slow breathing. Kakashi had looked at him intensely, eyes scorched like he was staring at a moment not conceived, as if he meant to quietly ask as to when it was that Tenzou had decided to move on without him.

“Did you expect something more of me?” Tenzou had finally asked him, gently, softly.

Kakashi’s hands had been closed, grasped firmly around the curve of a small cup carrying their morning tea.

“No,” the other man had lied.

Tenzou had packed a small bag and left their apartment of seven years on a hot, white day in late September and as he exited the apartment, stepping out into the humidity, the skies had just begun to rain.

Between them there had been no fighting, no yelling, no anything. Because for all Kakashi was, or rather had been to him, Tenzou had softly told the other man he thought they needed space and by the means of a solitary understanding nod, their relationship had come to a standstill.

When he had shown up at Genma’s doorstep little less than an hour later, drenched from the spending too much time walking in the light rains, the other man had simply called him a fucking idiot and Tenzou could only agree.

Now however, was now.

In the post-break world, he found himself spending most of his time rehabilitating Genma’s plants in idle complacency and not thinking about Kakashi. Between saving flowers and trimming overgrown potted trees, he knew the worst between him and the other man was yet to come. He _knew_ this and yet somehow he was helpless as to how to stop it all from happening.

He didn’t have to wait long, however.

The worst came to be on a Friday evening following a trip to the market for fresh potting soil. He had run into Kakashi near the flower shop and the other man had quietly if not insistently asked Tenzou if he would come over to the apartment the next day for breakfast to talk. Tenzou, knowing that this had been the inevitable conclusion to everything that happened up until this point in time, had evenly complied; there was no point in delaying it (the inevitable end that was), but it still didn’t stop him from feeling overwhelmingly distressed.

As he had watched Kakashi walk away, Pakkun in tow, Tenzou had felt furious by the deep-rooted silence that had followed with the other man’s simple request. There and then, he knew that this all had to end. He knew because something pivotal between them had changed; he didn’t know what it was, or how this change had come so quickly, but it had been there, ever since his birthday, ebbing and pulling at the space between them (a staggering phenomenon occurring even now as he stood steadfastly beneath the fluttering paper lanterns of the nearby alleyway).

The dirt forgotten, Tenzou went home to Genma’s and drank himself stupid instead.

Morning came with an unnerving hangover, and after drinking copious amounts of water, he went one last time to the Hamura estate. He had thought seeing the farm one last time before he finally requested the appropriate release documentation would only reassure him in his endeavours (and make him feel less guilty about ruining their relationship). He had thought seeing it so clearly and freshly would press his resolve as to so he would not break.

But what he thought did not matter. Everything had already fallen apart and the farm had been sold. Instead, Tenzou was now left with nothing but a growing pit of disappointment that had breached the bottom of his already ill stomach.

Uneasily, he walked back to town, sweating slightly in humid albeit drizzling dampness. It was ten minutes past eight, and when he knocked on his old apartment door not even the water he had consumed in the hours previous could stop his stomach from lurching.

Moments later, Kakashi answered and let him in without a word. With a small, uneven smile, he led Tenzou into the kitchen area where he noted that the other man had prepared them a small meal of sugared plums and green tea for breakfast.

“There in season,” Kakashi told him kindly, but said nothing else, pulling from their cupboard two bowls and two cups a piece.

As Tenzou sat down and the other man placed the porcelain bowl of fruit in front of him and began to work on pouring the pair two cups of hot, green tea. Tenzou murmured a small: “thank-you,” and when Kakashi was finished he too sat, picking up his chopsticks and slicing through the ripe fruit as though it were almost too tender.

Slowly, they then ate in silence.

Tenzou had barely even touched the meal, and knowing that this small act was their final swan song, he couldn’t summon the courage to end it. While he tried his best to eat the food in front of him, he instead found himself concreting on the aching in his chest, hollowing and numb.  

Kakashi, however, had nearly finished his meal and only when he went to set down the lacquered chopsticks on the tabletop did Tenzou force himself to take a bite of the fruit.

Kakashi waited for him patiently, but when he had still said nothing, sipping peacefully from his cup, Tenzou bit his lip and tried one last time for their own personal brand of normalcy.

“This is nice,” Tenzou tried uneasily, referring to the plums.

Kakashi nodded in agreement, but said little in return.

Tenzou found himself sighing and tiredly, he tried again.

“And I was also thinking,” he started out slowly, fingers fumbling to dissect one of the plums with his the chopsticks by the means of injured arm.

“As you do often.” Kakashi reached across the table and sliced through the piece of fruit for Tenzou with graceful simplicity. Tenzou tried for a small smile in return, but instead found himself feeling sick.

“I was thinking about buying the old Hamura farm,” Tenzou tried again, words tentative and uneasy.

“A _farm_ ,” Kakashi repeated speculatively, but not unkindly. Tenzou blinked, his chest tight and tongue sandpaper dry. Wordlessly he nodded and took a lengthy sip of his tea.

“I was,” Tenzou he finally told the other man firmly after setting his cup back down, leaning freely into the back of the old, wooden chair. “But…” He thought to the farmstead sitting empty in the rain, the sign of sale noticeably absent. “Somebody has already purchased it,” he finished softly.

Kakashi took another sip of his tea and Tenzou swallowed thickly. It was still hot out despite unending rains and he found himself breaking out into a silent, humid sweat.

“And I know I haven’t been fair to you to you as of late,” he went on to say. His words were becoming a tangled mess in his mouth and his chest was no longer tight, but aching. “But I—,”

“—that wouldn’t have been a terrible idea,” Kakashi cut him off simply, setting down his cup.

Tenzou coloured deeply and blinked.

“I— _what?_ ”

“A farm,” Kakashi repeated breezily, shoulders dipping low as he leaned back into the curve of his chair. “It wouldn’t have been a terrible idea.”

Tenzou fidgeted and bit his lip.

“It wouldn’t have been?” he asked, trying for calm and coming up short.

“It would have been a nice place to retire and relax,” the other man responded with an evenly placed smile. “Pakkun would have liked it too,” he added. “And Gai is always talking about how stuffy it is in his apartment. I’m sure he would have liked to visit as well.”

Tenzou nodded and forced a small, sad smile mirrored in regret.

“I wanted to fix it up,” Tenzou went on say candidly, as if suddenly a floodgate had been opened, the uneasiness washing away with each quick rush of pooling water. “Maybe plant a small garden.”

“And when were you going to do this?” Kakashi smiled speculatively, taking a small sip from his near empty cup.

“Soon,” Tenzou responded eagerly, but then his face fell flat, remembering that the estate had been sold. “I mean, that was, after I had discussed it with you. But not now,” he finished despondently.

Kakashi hummed idly through his small smile and set his cup back down, the cup near empty. Then, conversationally, he said to Tenzou:

“Sai tells me you’ve been buying a lot of books on gardening.”

Tenzou abruptly coloured again, but he nodded quietly.

“At Etsuko’s,” he tried awkwardly.

Kakashi let out an emphatic “ _mmhmm_ ,” before adding:

“And I ran into Genma the other day at the market…”

Tenzou internally winced—he knew that whatever Genma had to say was undoubtedly bad.

“He said that you’ve been helping him pick out plants that he won’t kill,” Kakashi hummed. “But he also said that you’ve been talking endlessly about the last the time you saw the Hamura cherry-tree orchard in bloom.”

Tenzou was mildly relieved at Genma’s uncanny tact, but it couldn’t stop his gaze from falling quietly to the tabletop.

“None of the kids these days ever remember seeing it,” he said after a brief pause. “But I do, years ago.”

“It  _was_ spectacular,” Kakashi agreed kindly.

“Sakura—even Genma—think that all the trees have died,” Tenzou went on to tell him. “But I was thinking, that maybe with enough care, and a little chakra, they could be revived.”

Kakashi nodded faintly and popped a full plum into his mouth, licking his sticky fingers with a succinctly deft suck. Momentarily, the other man was silent and he poured himself another cup of tea, now lukewarm.

“I’ve been speaking with Naruto this summer as well—,” Kakashi then went on to say.

Again, Tenzou found himself fidgeting uncomfortably, wondering with silent dread what else other people had been telling Kakashi these days.

“—and this spring, we’ll be travelling to see the Daimyo in the nation’s capital,” he told Tenzou evenly. “We haven’t told anyone yet, but I think it’s time the village saw a new Hokage,” he finished with a gentle smile.

Tenzou dumbly blinked, a strange albeit warm feeling of confusion rising slowly in his chest. A new Hokage? Surely Kakashi couldn’t be serious…but before he could speak, the other man stood, carrying his now empty cup and bowl towards the sink.

“So a farm,” Kakashi said lightly, running the dishes under a stream of rushing water and soap, “I think that would have been nice.”

“Ah, senpai, I’m sorry,” Tenzou responded mutely, feeling overwhelming disappointed for the second time that morning. He turned his attention to the window, staring out at the rainy streets of Konohagakure and felt a sharp pang of guilt. “I should have told you months ago,” he tried, tone bitter. “But I didn’t think…I mean, you like this apartment—we’ve been here for years. And you like being close to our friends and the market district and your office,” he went on to say. “But I…”

He drifted off weakly, unable to finish.

“—want to retire,” Kakashi finished for him.

Tenzou was a silent, his brain running through all the days and weeks and months leading up to between here and now. He thought of his quiet resignation and of the last glimpse of happiness he had felt in ages (disappearing calmly in that moment when that kid Aki had died). He thought of Genma and the farm, and of Sakura’s too patient albeit judgemental smiles that flitted evenly across her worried face with every calloused injury he had sustained. He thought of his worn books from Etsuko’s, diligently hidden in the apartment, as if the mere concept of starting a new life as a son of the earth was something he could not fathom. He thought of the sun and the heat his own graceless listlessness, and steadfastly, quietly, he waited for it all to exhaust itself. No moment of resolution came however, no sudden, jarring solution to it all; just the unbidden and undying desire for it to stop, and knew that retirement was the key.

“I do,” Tenzou said at long last. “Ever since my birthday.”

Kakashi again hummed pleasantly and Tenzou slouched forward, leaning heavily in abandonment on the wooden tabletop. He still didn’t know where all of this speculative conjecture left them, but Kakashi however, seemed unfazed by the conversation and continued to wash the dishes in the sink. When he was finished, Tenzou watched as the other man set down his cup and small bowl off to the side, cleaned and dry.

“Tenzou—,”

Tenzou looked up. Kakashi, despite the unrelenting completeness of what Tenzou’s desire to retirement meant, was clear-eyed and bright. “Follow me.”

Kakashi proceeded to saunter a short distance into their sitting room, clearing off the pile of his lewd books that sat splayed on their low-set table in front of the couch. Tenzou, automatic and anxious, followed. With muted interested, he watched as Kakashi gingerly pulled open one of the drawers and from within it, retrieved a large legal-sized envelope, the end tied loosely shut with a red, thin string.

“This is the deed to the Hamura estate,” the other man stated plainly, setting it down on the tabletop between them.

Tenzou blinked. There was an instantaneous rush of shock and perhaps even awe, and he suddenly found himself unable to properly speak.

“Kakashi, _I_ —,” he started slowly, the words fumbling over his fairly useless tongue.

“—I purchased it three days ago after talking to Sakura and Sai,” Kakashi said in kind, carefully unwinding the string that bound the envelope closed. He was smiling, Tenzou noted, much as he had been all morning. Pulling the thick sheaves of legal paper out of the envelope, he handed them to Tenzou, eyes crinkling into mischievous lidded half-moons.

“I’ve also drawn up a set of discharge papers for you as well, but those in my office. You can sign them whenever you please.”

Tenzou nodded, a halting calmness settling evenly in the depths of his chest. Between them there was still silence, but Tenzou didn’t feel its weight or uneven edges anymore. Instead, in that moment, his brain had rebelled. It ran ardently through peaceful scenarios of a life once only dreamed upon, throwing up images of quiet summer days where he could feel the beat of the sun soaking in his skin, soil pliant and wet beneath the soft grooves of his fingernails. In this world there was no blood and no sharpened metal blades and no dying—just the blunt, rusty head of a trowel as he dug in the fields, his tawny, golden face whispering secrets to the cherry trees, coaxing them back into bloom.

“You’ve done well, Tenzou,” Kakashi then added, tone firm. “And I think it’s time that you and _I_ ,” he added with staid evenness, “take a break, don’t you think?”

“Senpai,” he murmured gratefully though an ever growing smile. “I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything,” Kakashi smiled patiently, drawing near. “Just tell me you’ll have the place livable by next spring.”

Tenzou nodded, promising as much through his small smile and deeply, he exhaled. For Kakashi was gentleness and evenness and understanding—even when he wasn’t—and as the skies kept pouring, eking out the quietness of their old apartment with the pattering of rain, Tenzou pulled the other man into a hard and sudden embrace.

“We’re in this together,” Kakashi assured him softly, murmuring the much needed words into the crook of Tenzou’s neck. “Don’t ever forget that, Tenzou.” He squeezed Tenzou close and with an unnerving sort of intenseness, did not let go.

Tenzou, with his pulse slowed and his breath caught deep in his throat, barely managed to whisper back.

“I almost did."

With breathes hitched and eyes stretched shut, the lights around them flickered. Outside, in the streets, the monsoon rains were carrying away the last of the summer’s humidity, drop by drop, and in that moment Tenzou knew (as he always had) that he was never going to find the full road to complete recovery. It didn’t matter. Not right now at least.

His eyes opened, and with the gentle touch of Kakashi’s kiss, the seasons changed.

**Author's Note:**

> So there you have it. The long winding conclusion to the 'Anima' series. There's probably mistakes - I've re-read this sucker a dozen and a half times, but I know I always miss something. Who knows - maybe I'll write an epilogue one day with Kakashi and Tenzou living a quiet life on the farm. All their former students can come visit, and so can their kids. Anyways, hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thanks for all the support.


End file.
